What is PRIDE?
PRIDE is the school acronym as a part of our Positive Behavior Intervention System (PBIS). The focus is to educate and reinforce our students in desirable and beneficial behaviors. PRIDE stands for Persistence, Respect, Initiative, Dependability, and Empathy. When we see students demonstrating characteristics of PRIDE, we seek to recognize and celebrate their positive behaviors.
Persistence
Persistence is a great starting point as developing this skill in students will serve them in everything they do throughout their lives. The ability to overcome adversity and setbacks is directly tied to their ability to persist towards desired outcomes. Students demonstrate persistence by staying organized and on top of their school work, turning assignments in completed and on time, and not giving up on things when they get difficult. These students pursue help when available and persist until their work is complete.
Respect
Respect can be an often overused and misunderstood concept. Many people are comfortable with the most superficial of definitions that might focus on being polite and displaying good manners. While these are worthy traits, they are only the beginnings of what respect truly means. First and foremost, we want our students to show self-respect. Putting forth your best effort and working hard, taking responsibility for your actions, establishing self-worth, and taking pride in who you are and what you do are ways to show self-respect. When you can respect yourself, you can better respect your surroundings and those around you. These traits are contagious, and when our students are secure, we can all get along respectfully and harmoniously.
Initiative
Taking initiative is a crucial lesson for our middle school students to learn. We want our students to become self-sufficient and to take responsibility for their education. This is also the most difficult to impart, and giving students the opportunity and freedom to take control and show initiative does bear some risk. While we want students to understand that their choices have consequences, we want them to be reinforced with positive consequences when they make good choices. When things go awry, we want to have clear guidelines and understandable consequences that serve as a deterrent to poor decisions. This not only creates sustaining behaviors and choices, but generates the conditions for students to begin to show initiative.
Dependability
Dependability and maturity go hand and hand. A dependable student embraces responsibility and can be relied upon to be where they are supposed to be and doing what they are supposed to be doing, without prompts or reminders. They are consistent, helpful, and always do the right thing.
Empathy
Empathy is a foundational trait that will carry our students into adulthood as contributing members of our society. Through empathy we are able to understand one another, and ultimately help one another and take care of one another. Empathy is the activator for growing from a “bystander” to an “upstander”. Empathy is how we address the behaviors and feelings around “bullying”, a pervasive challenge in this age group. We use the Path 2 Empathy program to help our students think beyond themselves. Students can show empathy by being aware of the impact of their actions and words on others.